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A Vietnamese man died of malaria in Angola early this week, but the southern African country refused to help send his body home, saying he had been working illegally.

An official from Ha Tinh Province told Phap Luat Thanh Pho Ho Chi Minh newspaper that a group of workers from the province had called home from Angola informing the death of Nguyen Truong Minh.

The 26-year-old reportedly died on Monday of malignant malaria.

Other Vietnamese workers had sent him to a private hospital in the capital city of Luanda but doctors could not save him.

Vietnamese labor exporters were allowed to start sending workers to Angola in early 2014, but it is believed that tens of thousands of Vietnamese had traveled there to work under short-term, unofficial contracts even before that.

Minh was one of them.

His family said he had to pay a large sum to illegal brokers to enter Angola as a tourist and then overstayed his visa to work at construction sites.

The Vietnamese community in Angola is now raising money to send his body home, as his family could not afford the cost.

At least 28 workers from Ha Tinh and neighboring Nghe An Province died in Angola from March 2013 due to accidents, illnesses and in murder robberies.

All of them were illegal workers and thus received no help or protection from the local authorities.